


Students Ship Them

by Nny11



Category: Mass Effect - All Media Types, Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: F/F, Gen, High School AU-Students Ship Them, Ragin' Rachni, Someone help Elissa to stop being a complete dork and loser thanks, relationship discussed via OCs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-17
Updated: 2017-09-21
Packaged: 2018-12-03 06:50:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11526834
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nny11/pseuds/Nny11
Summary: Ms. Shepard and Ms. T'Soni are not dating. It's obvious, it's plain as day! And Elissa would really appreciate it if all her friends would stop mooning over them.Despite her best attempts to appeal to their better senses, the student body is convinced and just so happens to be shipping them.





	1. Field Day

“Aw, they are just so sweet!” Amala crooned softly.

Elissa shot a sideways glare to her best friend, who currently appeared on the verge of crying. Like this was a wedding they were attending instead of waiting for a turn at tug-a-war-which they were going to win by the way! While Elissa was not a very tall person, she was a very strong person and her favorite thing after wiping the floor in a hover ball game was being at the end of a tug-a-war rope. And pizza, probably. Amala on the other hand was Asari, which placed her at a modest height of 6’ 4”, and a distinct preference for deflecting to brute force stoppage. Of course she was more interested in something besides their match.

“Please,” Elissa begged, “please stop going on about them. They are totally not together ok? And it’s creepy. You, are creepy.”

Amala’s pointed glare did little more than make Elissa struggle not to laugh.

“It’s not creepy, it’s love. They are completely in love. Smitten! You’re just jealous of how perfect they are.” Amala said with arms crossed defiantly across her chest, one purple finger pointed to the two figures awkwardly standing next to each other. “Totally together, right there, more than Keilrok and Tavo.”

Standing about 15 feet away from them were Coach Shepard and Coach T’Soni. To be fair they both taught classes besides PE but right now, it was coach time. Elissa could tell because Shepard had her baseball cap on and had a whistle around her neck, and T’Soni was wearing a t-shirt and shorts instead of one of her favored dresses. That meant go time, run fast, climb fast, go hard or go home. If you thought T’Soni would let you slack you would be wrong, soft voice hard heart in Elissa’s opinion. Honestly she had been ten minutes late, how did that warrant an extra mile?

Likewise in physics you couldn’t expect Shepard to let things slide, that woman was always a perfectionist. So maybe Elissa didn’t always check her math, and perhaps she could pay more attention during lecture. Still, being volunteered for the bowling ball demonstration about entropy had only been cool after the fact. The fact that she flinched on the first upswing and didn’t get her the dangled extra credit points had only rubbed a little salt in the wound.

Right now, the two were in solid coach mode and had this one joint time a day to teach together. Elissa thought the student body’s obsession with this “power couple” was ridiculous. They were obviously not together. Shepard and T’Soni were just awkward dorks, seemingly worried about even having to brush past each other in the hallway. The only time they weren’t shifting uncomfortably during a silence or lapse in conversation was when they were trying to supplement what the other was saying, and only managing to confuse their class. 

Elissa’s favorite, when the two had bickered for the better part of an hour about if dodge ball was about the agility to dodge or the strength and speed to hit. Of course this was done haltingly, with a lot of unnecessary words.

“I’m not saying your point isn’t valid, but have you considered?”

“That is an excellent argument, but you are forgetting this small detail surrounding…”

“Truth be told, and I’m not arguing with you, I’m not, I agree, but I still think the thing is!”

“Honestly, I also agree with you and your point, however, that being said, there is more going on!”

“Can we please just agree that there are differing opinions, values, and viewpoints on this?”

“Why are we arguing about dodge ball? Dodge ball!”

While Elissa had happily spent the time counting passive aggressive commentary and playing with her long braid, Amala had been sighing in contentment. As if she was the one in love, making big doe eyes at the two and cooing. It was disgusting.

“Girl, you drew them holding hands and blushing the other day. That is creepy.” Elissa smirked as Tavo was pulled into the grass. There was something so satisfying about watching him fail miserably at human sports. Especially if things got tangled in his fringe.

“Yeah, well, Jenny wrote fanfiction about them going to college together. So I’m not  _ that _ creepy really.” Amala said with a dismissive snort.

Elissa was lucky not to choke on her tongue. “Jenny what!?”

Amala smiled widely before launching into her bawdy tale, “Oh yeah, she wrote a romance fanfic for them as an English assignment. Ms. Williams used it as an example in class along with a reminder that ‘Jane’ and ‘Lara ‘ needed a bit more work to not resemble people living or dead.”

“Oh my God!” Elissa started to laugh imagining poor Jenny Grenbrook’s already pink face turning redder with embarrassment. Jenny always was bolder in writing than in person.

“And H’Tok doodled them kissing on his algebra assignment.  Ms. Zorah gave him five extra credit points for, and I quote, spreading the love!” Amala’s grin was huge as she made a little heart symbol with her hands.

“She did not! …did she?” Elissa covered her mouth hoping to not draw the attention of the aforementioned “couple” to their conversation.

Amala wasn’t done, the only thing that would stop her from creeping on their coaches was a good story. “Yeah, Goddess, Elissa where have you been this last year, under a rock? Listen, Martin was passing a note to that new kid, the Krogan yeah? Mr. G caught them.”

Elissa was laughing harder than she had in a long time, Mr. Vakarian was famous for making students answer omni calls in front of the class and opening notes up under his projector screen so the whole class could read them. “Oh—stop! I can’t, I can’t breath!”

Amala started to laugh unable to get the words out for a minute herself. “It was a limerick about those two and azures!”

As they continued to cackle the girl behind them politely butted in. “Excuse me, are you talking about Shoni?”

Elissa managed to pull herself together first, “Shoni?”

The girl looked highly uncomfortable. “Um…”

“Shepard and T’Soni’s power couple name, duh.” Amala said as if Elissa had casually said the earth was flat instead of being confused at a made up moniker. “And yeah, we totally are, they are so sweet!”

Her squeal is enough to actually draw the attention of the two coaches. The girl’s smile suddenly sprung forth, full teeth and everything. “I know! They are so married!” 

Elissa tried desperately to somehow create distance between herself and them. While standing in a jam packed line. When you are officially at the front of that line. 

Effectively she just nudged their entire groups forward a shuffle, placing them closer to the very people she hoped would not see, hear, or notice them. With a strained smile she waved at them. After a small pause where they looked at each other, T’Soni waved back slowly. As her two companions continued to loudly discuss how Shoni was a ship that would never sink and apparently sailed forever on a beautiful perfect ocean at sunset while rose petals fell from the sky (or something), Elissa continued to smile awkwardly and wave with one hand. She used her other arm to sharply hit Amala in the ribs, and was promptly hit in the back of the head. T’Soni’s eye grew huge and Shepard blasted her whistle while walking over with purpose.

This was beyond day ruining, this was Field Day ruining. And high school ruining. Probably life ruining if anyone thought they’d escape from a determined Shepard.

“Ok ladies, anyone want to explain to me what is going on over here?” Shepard’s voice had a hard edge to in. “Ha Levi, stop waving, it’s gotten creepy.”

Elissa’s hand dropped back down to her side and panicked. Frozen like a newborn deer about to be mauled by a wolf. Amala’s face somehow managed to shift to a darker shade of purple, which honestly seemed unfair and impossible. The girl behind them had wisely pretended to have never known them at all. The traitor.

“Well?” This time it was from T’Soni, whose voice was soft but held the promise of danger.

Elissa finally blurted, “Friendly discourse! Debate! For class, debate class, about, uhm, uh, about stuff and things.”

Amala’s face transformed from just embarrassment to near horror.

“Oh yeah?” Shepard jutted one hip out while, to Elissa’s mild horror, T’Soni appeared to be struggling not to laugh. “Debate class on stuff and things. Care to be more specific Ms. Ha Levi? Maybe Ms. Yatoi would like to add something on this since her avid...rebuttal caught my attention.”

“We were talking about you two!” Amala confessed before casting about desperately for a life line. “I mean, is it true you two met on an Alliance ship or was it in college?”

Shepard glanced over at her colleague with a bewildered look. T’Soni shrugged and gave a cough, which did not fully cover soft chuckling she was trying to stop.

“Because, it’s a big debate we have, in debate club. We choose topics and things that we’re familiar with and everything.” Amala continued to dig a hole for them.

Elissa looked longingly at the tug-a-war rope.

“How we met?” Shepard asked with the same tone the lady at the MVD would call out people’s numbers.

“Yes, mm-hm.” Elissa agreed having decided it wasn’t fair to leave Amala hanging. Why couldn’t something happen to distract everyone? A sudden thunderstorm. Earthquake. Something! Was a little world ending destruction that much to ask for?

Before Shepard could grill them further, God himself seemed to make H’Tok suddenly headbutt the Krogan next to him. Even better than world ending!

“I should go,” Shepard said with no small amount of obvious relief before blowing her whistle and marching towards them. 

T’Soni watched as Shepard somehow physically separate the two pups,before turning back to them.

“I would suggest coming up with a more plausible cover story with a bit less room for interpretation and need for a friend to bail you out next time.” She paused for a second before adding, “We met when Shepard saved my life, she was in the Marine Corps and I was teaching at Serric University. I hope this helps to settle your debate.”

As T’Soni walked over to help break up the small crowd that gathered to watch an infamous verbal shredding by Shepard, Elissa sagged with relief.

“Goddess....this changes everything. They’re not just married, they are soul mates! I bet they’re bonded!” Amala declared.

Elissa gave her another hard elbow strike, luckily unnoticed this time.

 


	2. Brothean

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If Amala would like to stop trying to ruin Elissa's life, she'd appreciate it!

Elissa flipped her pencil around her thumb, well she  tried to-she watched it stutter and fall to the floor with a sigh. History. Ancient history. Literally, like, at least a thousand years ago or something! Grunting as she tried to lean down in the far too small desk, Elissa bumped her head on the way up and stabbed graphite into her palm. She stared at her palm for a moment, and her new prison tattoo before trying to flip her pencil again. This time it had the grace to fall on top of the desk. Oh the joys of history.

In the seat next to her, Amala wore a completely bored expression although Elissa noted that she was doing some stick figure doodling. There was something familiar about the stick figures but after field day, she didn’t even want to know. On her other side Kielrok was trying to subtly crane his neck to see the drawings. Because a Krogan obviously could do that inconspicuously.

At the front of the room Ms. T’Soni was excitedly explaining something about Inusannon architecture and the way it affected Prothean engineering. Ms. T’Soni was drawing an example of the arches on a chalkboard, God knew how she had managed to find an honest to goodness chalk board, but there it was. Scribbled into the corners of the board were small drawings that students had left, the occasional “Ms. T Rocks!”, and history puns. Somehow whenever Elissa tried to write or draw on the board it got wiped down the next day. She frowned slightly as she noted a stick figure Amala had drawn in the lower left corner. Rude.

Kielrok’s low chuckle easily caught everyone’s attention and thanks to him sort of looking at her-they consequently looked at her. Elissa slumped down as far as the metal bar would let her, her knees knocking into the chair in front of her to Brandon’s annoyance. He half turned to glare at her and Elissa gave a slight push with her knees. Yeah, take that Brandon, Brodon, Bropheus, Brothean. She really shouldn’t be so hostile. There was nothing wrong with Brandon, his habit of leaving chewing gum under his desk was really the only down side and that was child’s play. This was a public school, if she couldn’t handle a little dried gum under the desks she might as well drop out and smoke under the bleachers, or, whatever it was that actual dropouts did. Get a job and be responsible or something?

“Anything you would like to share with us Ms. Ha Levi?” T’Soni, the lady scared her. Quiet scary.

“No ma’am, just learning about Prothean science and stuff.” Elissa tried to at least sound fake interested, the way you dumbly nod when your significant other was rambling on about that thing they love that you don’t care for. Why yes dear. Fascinating dear.

Ms. T’Soni’s not eyebrows shot up slightly clearly bemused. 

Busted.

Elissa cleared her throat and sat up straighter as the lesson continued.

Amala sent her a small message via omni, attached was a badly drawn rendition of Coach Shepard rescuing Ms. T’Soni, whose hand rested in distress on her forehead. There was a very, very badly drawn gun shaped like a dolphin next to them with the words “this is her marine gun” next to it. Traitor! Amal’s violet eyes stared resolutely forward as Elissa glared daggers at her.

_ r u trying to get me in trouble _

_ Are you trying to be such an easy target? _

_ u are awful n we can’t b friends anymore _

_ I’m heart broken, woe, woe is me! How shalt I live without my walking armrest? _

_ hey! _

_ My fun sized human! _

_ look beanpole _

_ My teacup human! _

_ u done? _

_ Give me a second. … yeah, I want to make a joke about your name and shorty but it’s not happening. _

“Ms. Ha Levi, despite your ‘listening to me about Prothean stuff’ you seem very distracted. Show me your tablet.” Ms. T’Soni walked into the rows of desks, somehow gracefully not knocking a single one over where Elissa tended to bruise her hips getting in and out. It simply wasn’t fair.

Elissa glanced at Amala, both with panic stricken faces before it hit her. Elissa smirked. /If I’m going down you are going down with me./ As she began to turn her tablet with the incriminating drawing over, the door slammed opened.

“Hey Li can I…uhm, so you’re in class.” Shepard coughed awkwardly and hovered half in and half out the door.

“Hey you can you…?”  Ms. T’Soni grinned, one hand on Elissa’s desk.

Saved by the dork with the whistle blowing complex! Elissa began to furiously delete the last several messages from her tablet.

“Er, is it alright if I borrow your model of the universe?” Shepard shuffled further in. “Hey Bowe, you still owe me chapter five.”

Tamrik groaned and began to dig through his bag under Shepard’s watchful gaze.

“Am I getting it back in one piece?” Ms. T’Soni asked still hovering over Elissa’s desk. As if this was the ideal place to have a conversation with someone across the room. Elissa could feel the sweat beading on her brow and she furiously did a full system wipe.

“Yes.” Shepard sounded bored as she grabbed the missing homework assignment out of Tamrik’s grumbling hands.

“Without the use of super glue?” Ms. T’Soni asked, leaning with one hip on the desk now.

Shepard scratched at the back of her neck and shrugged, “…sure?”

“Shepard!” Actually, it was kinda funny to hear Ms. T’Soni use that voice with someone who isn’t a student.

“Ok, ok, no glue!”

“Or magnets.”

“You are just, you are just not even fun you know? Fine I’ll make sure we don’t break, destroy, mangle, maim, or harm your model. Yeash.” Shepard jammed her hand into her pocket and watched as Liara walked to the back where her cabinets squatted like angry trolls ready to eat any bad students. There was a very good reason that Elissa refused to sit back there thank you very much.

“Alright, class please try to focus while I deal with this. The Prothean’s architecture was less refined than we know it as…”

Elissa immediately cued into Shepard, who at the word Protheans, had gotten wide eyes and slowly waved her free hand as if in awe.

“…considering their structures are still used as the bones by our civilizations it’s obvious that the Protheans…”

Again, Shepard made it a point to look awe struck as she pressed her hands into her cheeks. Students struggled not to laugh outright, someone snorted behind her. Elissa looked at Amala who was grinning, her tablet still configuring and forgotten on the desk.

“Which is why Prothean…”

This time Shepard threw a hand over her forehead and popped one of her legs up.

“Prothean, Prothean, Prothean, yes I know what you are doing up there thank you very much.”

Shepard awkwardly lowered her hand, once more reserved and dorky like usual. The class laughed as she was caught out by Ms. T’Soni, who hadn’t even bothered to peak out from behind the cabinet. Elissa stared in wonder. Shepard was never a prankster or joker in class and on the field she was a different woman entirely. What was this? What was  _ this? _

“Thanks for the model. We should do this more often. I should go.” Shepard, arms full of discs and spinning parts shuffled back out the door and tried to close it with her foot several times until T’Soni simply walked over and shut it.

Elissa’s tablet went off.

_ AH, She called her Li! Cutest nickname since ever!!!! _

Elissa flushed red and focused as hard as she could on T’Soni.

_ And they totally were joking and flirting, Li helps Shepard break out of her shell. So romantic! _

“Ms. Ha Levi! Your tablet if you please!” T’Soni had her hand out.

Elissa tried desperately to delete again even as it was pulled out of her hands.


	3. I'm trying to eat here...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Elissa's perfectly good lunch is basically, almost, not really ruined by her friends. Let a girl eat in peace!

“It was raining!” Elissa groaned hands over her face, trying, trying to just enjoy lunch. Was this too much to ask? How was this too much to ask?

“And they were totally sharing her coat because they are sweet on each other, like a film or something!” Amala batted her eyelashes and stared into a corner of the cafeteria as if rewatching the moment against its gum riddled surface.

“No, they were sharing her coat because it was raining cats and dogs.” Elissa huffed and decided to just concentrate on the good things in her life. Like food. She cast a hopeful glance her tray; probably pizza, probably fruit, probably vegetables. It was hard to tell when you have to cater to so many aliens. She had wanted some of the blue glowing jelly thing but had been shooed away by the frankly terrifying cook even as Amala took a double helping of it. Honestly that was just a double rude metaphorical slap to the face.

“Raining-what? Wait, does that happen on Earth? Raining cats and dogs?” Kielrok’s eyes were wide with wonder, a grin already splitting his face.

“What? No! Well, birds and fish sometimes, read that in an article for current events.” Elissa sat up straighter and tried to sound cool and tough. She figured if she could impress Kielrok he would someday let her ride on his shoulders at the hover ball games. He could charge them through the crowds, everyone breaks rank for krogans after all. Her body was ready for glory.

“You are disgusting and earth sounds terrifying.” Amala casually noted as she ate some of the glowing jelly. “Look the point is they totally shared T’Soni’s coat and were smiling like kids. How beautiful is that? How romantic is that?”

Before Elissa could retort Kielrok rumbled, “Pretty romantic.”

She had to stop her head from slamming into the probably pizza maybe meatloaf in agony. Amala had corrupted their krogan!

Tavo laughed, in that kinda creepy Turian way, and draped himself all over the greenish Krogan pup at his side. “I finally got you into Shoni? When were you going to tell me?”

“At the two month anniversary,” Kielrok basically preened as his boyfriend rewarded him with a hump scratch.

“Am I seriously the only one who isn’t crazy? It’s obvious they are totally barely even friends!” Elissa was feeling the pain in her soul. This is what her life had been reduced to. Not wild parties, boys, alcohol, and all that other stuff she’d been promised. Just an entire school’s obsession with two complete losers.

“Uhm, Elissa?” Came the quiet voice of a girl sitting next to their group. “They, uh, they totally are, not saying, just saying.” She quickly stood and left, a mystery of the ages, a voice in the storm. A random girl with a custom made pin that had a heart and “Shoni” on it.

“Look she doesn’t count as an authority--that was a clearly biased opinion!” Elissa paused as she reconsidered the group she was sitting with. Clearly this group was an unbiased source of information. 

“Look, this is a safe zone, a no judgement zone, which is why we are judging you so harshly over this. You understand romance and flirting the way a rock understand physics.” Amala paused then corrected, “Ok that was not a good example, you understand romance and flirting the way a rock understands photosynthesis.”

Elissa felt a twitch developing somewhere in her eyeball and was promptly grossed out. Turning her gaze away she noticed another backpack with the Shoni pin. What is wrong with my entire school? Is it the food? Elissa contemplated as she chewed the totally pizza, and allowed her friends obsessive conversation to wash over her. Brandon walked by and waved, while she tried to desperately wipe sauce off her chin. If she could salvage lunch by finally having him recognize her-on his vest was a Shoni pin. Ew!

“Ok I’m sorry, did someone make a thousand of those stupid Shoni pins and just give them away?”

Three sets of eyes met around the table. “Girl, seriously starting to think your house is a rock; you may in fact be a rock living under a rock. Michelle was selling those at the crafts fair for a quarter each.” Amala held up her bag where another Shoni pin was.

“I saw Shepard with one of those.” Kielrok said as if mentioning what he ate for breakfast was just ok.

“She what?? Details you dumb lizard, details!” Amala, unnecessarily in Elissa’s opinion, leaned over the table as if she couldn’t hear fine from where she was. As if they hadn’t literally had a random stranger join in on the conversation because of how loud they were. Elissa scooted the smallest bit away trying to create the illusion of not being a part of this group while still being polite and obviously part of the group.

They might be idiots, but they were her idiots. Her idiot friends with customized shoni pins. God have mercy.


	4. Excuse Note

“Well, well, well. Skipping out from under Shepard huh?”

Elissa froze as the deep tones of the security guard crashed into her. Guiltily looking up at him she half shrugged. “No. Maybe. Look, my friends are obsessed idiots and I wanted a little bit of sanity. Is that so much to ask?” She squinted at his name badge and awkwardly stretched shirt. “Grunt? That too much?”

“Heh heh heh.” He maintained eye contact during his slow chuckle. It was creepy times ten thousand. “You fed up with the mushy stuff too?”

To Elissa’s eternal shock, the Krogan leaned against the wall next to her causing it to shake. For a moment she worried they would both go through the brick wall right into Ms. Williams class, where she was probably going to be asked to diagram a sentence or explain the main imagery used in some obscure poem and how that related back to the zeitgeist of the times. Instead they simply stayed there leaning against the wall looking at each other. She had never really paid the security guard attention, well, except when he drove around in that little golf cart but mostly because the driver’s side would scrap the ground and the other side nearly left the ground. That was hilarious! Otherwise though, he simply quietly tromped around the grounds, surprisingly quiet for a few ton Krogan.

“Yeah, I guess. It just…” Elissa paused, was she really going to dump her guts on this guy’s shoes? Here? Now? Ugh. He just seemed like the first sane person she’d seen in months. “It’s too much you know? Like, why is everyone obsessed?”

He gave the Krogan version of a smile. “You aren’t going to like my answer kid, but I can understand wanting a break.” He reached into a pant pocket and pulled out a cigarette. “You smoke?”

Elissa wanted desperately to say yes just because being offered a way to break the rule by the security guy was awesome. Common sense returned moments later as the Krogan version of a cigarette was closer to a Human cigar and twice as foul. “No, thank you. What do you mean I wouldn’t like your answer?”

Again with the creepy chuckle.

“I know they are together, romantically. Don’t get it. Don’t like mushy stuff. But, they’re happy so why complain.” Grunt shrugged.

“No, not you too!” Elissa groaned as he grinned at her. “They, seriously, why does everyone see this? Maybe friends, but more?”

Grunt shrugged. “Honestly if they aren’t together I’d be more concerned. Shepard likes to get things done quickly and Liara gets kinda grabby when she wants something.”

“Oh-ho, so you don’t know! You just think and assume and obsess like the rest of us!” Elissa cut her gloating short at his rumble which she interpreted as a not happy sound. Clearing her throat she tried more diplomatically, “Ok, so there are signs and symptoms or something.”

They silently stayed at the wall in an awkward silence after that. Grunt smoking and Elissa trying to not cough, wave her hands to ward off the smoke, and generally look cool even as her eyes watered. Better than Amala who was going to heave up a lung someday with how much she sighs. Seriously, she’s like, what, fifty or sixty and hasn’t figured this out? So much for being the wise old one. As Elissa scuffed her shoes along the gravel She suddenly caught sight of the school nurse hustling towards them at a frankly terrifying clip.

“Grunt, put that out!”

The Krogan didn’t jump, but his eyes snapped open like he would’ve. In a quick mechanical motion he snubbed it on the side of the building and turned around. From the way he swung his arms Elissa was getting the impression that he was nervous. Or maybe that was her? That could be projecting. Ms. Chambers would be better suited to helping explain this probably. “Dr. Chakwas.”

“Smoking in front of one of our students, I’m appalled at you young man!” Chakwas hustled between them and began giving Elissa a quick check over.

The school nurse was actually a retired doctor, and had a penchant for following up with her wards and students as if it was always life and death. A no nonsense type but bizarrely caring, Elissa had totally faked sickness a few times to be allowed to lie down in the darkened room at the nurse’s office and have Chakwas dote on her. Besides, as she left she could usually get a cereal bar or fruit that was more obviously meant for human consumption than whatever was at the cafeteria. And maybe she had a small crush, whatever. Not a big deal. Totally not the point!

“Well I offered to smoke with her.” Grunt grumbled as Elissa had her face wiped down by a wet one. “She declined, good kid right?”

“Grunt, you are young and she is younger, no smoking on campus.” With a flourish Chakwas pulled out a small aerosol can and spritz Elissa and then the security officer who chomped at the misty cloud around him. “Now, may I ask why you are with this ragamuffin and not in class Elissa?”

Elissa managed to keep a dopey smile off her face. She knows my name. “Uh…” Somehow telling her about how far the school had fallen seemed rather shameful and completely embarrassing.

“Needed a break. Too much mushy stuff.” Grunt grinned.

Chakwas only looked confused for a moment before her face scrunched up, obviously trying not to laugh. “Oh, well then, poor company my dear. Grunt here is convinced he’s getting a stepmother.”

“Heh, heh, heh.”

“What?” Elissa tried to put the pieces together but it was rather like making apple juice with only your bare hands.

“Nothing important dear child, now, let me escort you back to class and we’ll call this one a medical emergency hm?” Chakwas gave Grunt a loving pat on the shoulder before waving Elissa to follow her.

They walked at a rather slow pace, but Elissa wasn’t going to complain too much. It wasn’t until they reached the commons and Chakwas turned left, away from the science building, that Elissa got suspicious. They meandered between planters with well-maintained flowers and overflowing trash bins, someone’s breakfast burrito had attracted what Elissa charitably thought of as birds to eat in front of the school mascot. In fact, this was the spot that all the school promotion was done from, the wall behind the sculpture was covered in beautiful green and pink vines and the Thessian trees drooped heavy with pale purple flowers on either side. The “Ragin’ Rachni” sculpture of course was the worst looking part, today someone had managed to shove sugar cubes into it’s mouth making it look buck toothed.

“How are you doing Elissa, to ditch out of class like that screams of some mental suffering to me. Even if it’s because you are a little squeamish about love.” Chakwas always had a way of saying things that sounded like they should be insulting, but somehow came out concerned and caring.

“I’m not, you know, squeamish. It’s just, oh God, so many of them are like, and you know how this school was two years ago when ‘Tarrus’ was the thing? Why? Don’t they have homework or something?!” Elissa managed to stop shoveling a hole long enough to run a hand through her hair. “Grunt said they were and they weren’t. I dunno. It would be easier if I just knew one way or the other?”

Chakwas nodded sagely even as she said, “Ah the impatience of youth.”

Elissa decided to take it as a, not compliment but not insult.

“Perhaps, seeing that you are so distressed, you should ask one of them.”

Elissa choked, crush or not maybe it was time to evaluate if Dr. Chakwas was actually insane. “No! Oh no! I am not committing to that kind of social death!”

Chakwas laughed, musically even if a little raspy. “Of course not! But a suggestion is all. And here we are.”

Elissa looked guiltily at the red brick building and pleadingly back at Chakwas who was already scribbling out a note for her to give Shepard. “I don’t suppose we could walk around the—“

“Not a chance.” She smiled as she turned the note over. “If you’ll excuse me I need to talk with Grunt about his smoking, please do the right thing especially as I put the time on that note.”

Elissa grunted and dragged her feet across the entryway.


End file.
